The Concept of Whole Substance in Galen’s "Simple Medicines"

Authors

  • John Wilkins University of Exeter, Department of Classics and Ancient History, Room 342, Amory Building, Rennes Drive, Streatham Campus Exeter EX4 4RJ, Great Britain https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4371-2975

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.18778/2084-140X.11.24

Keywords:

ancient medicine, Greek medicine, Galen, concept of whole substance, De simplicium medicamentorum temperamentis et facultatibus, On the Mixtures and Capacities of Simple Medicines

Abstract

Galen’s great treatise on drugs, Simple Medicines, begins with 5 theoretical books which explain the mechanisms of drug actions in the following catalogues. The key agent of change is the mixture of the qualities hot, cold, wet and dry. But drugs also have substance, the leaf, root or fruit of plants, the material of animals and minerals. How does substance act on the human body? This is one of the key questions for the theory of drugs, since mixtures had already been explored by Galen in Mixtures. Galen’s exploration of substance brings him to the composition of a drug – in thick or fine particles – and to the notion of substances in the plural and the notion of whole substance in the cases of foods and poisons, all of which Galen places in the class of drugs. Whole substance is the core of the paper. Galen’s understanding of substance as of qualities depends heavily, as often, on Aristotle. The paper presents an argument based on the key passages in Simples I–V, which I have recently translated for the Cambridge Galen series, as too on related passages in Mixtures and On the Capacities of Foods

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Claudii Galeni Opera Omnia, ed. K.G. Kühn, Leipzig 1822–1833.
Google Scholar

Galeni Pergameni Scripta Minora, ed. G. Helmreich, Leipzig 1893.
Google Scholar

Boudon-Millot V., La notion de mélange dans la pensée médicale de Galien: mixis ou crasis?, “Revue des études grecques” 124, 2011, p. 261–279 https://doi.org/10.3406/reg.2011.8063
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.3406/reg.2011.8063

Debru A., Philosophie et pharmacologie: la dynamique des substances leptomerès chez Galien, [in:] Galen on Pharmacology. Philosophy, History, and Medicine, ed. A. Debru, Leiden 1997 [= Studies in Ancient Medicine, 16].
Google Scholar

Harig G., Bestimmung der Intensität im medizinischen System Galens, Berlin 1974.
Google Scholar

Singer P., A Change in the Substance: Theory and its Limits in Galen’s Simples, “Archives internationales d’histoire des sciences” 70, 2020 (= Galen’s Treatise On Simple Drugs. Interpretation and Transmission, ed. M. Martelli, C. Petit, L. Ragetti), p. 16–53 https://doi.org/10.1484/J.ARIHS.5.122780
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1484/J.ARIHS.5.122780

van der Eijk P., Galen on the Assessment of Bodily Mixtures, [in:] The Frontiers of Ancient Science. Essays in Honor of Heinrich von Staden, ed. B. Holmes, K.-D. Fischer, Berlin–Boston 2015, p. 675–698 https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110336337-031
Google Scholar DOI: https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110336337-031

Vinkesteijn R., Philosophical Perspectives on Galen of Pergamum, Utrecht 2020 (PhD dissertation).
Google Scholar

Wenkebach E., Pfaff F., In Hippocratis Epidemiarum, Berlin 1934.
Google Scholar

Downloads

Published

2021-12-30

How to Cite

Wilkins, J. (2021). The Concept of Whole Substance in Galen’s "Simple Medicines". Studia Ceranea, 11, 479–491. https://doi.org/10.18778/2084-140X.11.24

Issue

Section

Articles